


5/20/19

by skuls



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-05-20
Packaged: 2019-05-09 13:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14716676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skuls/pseuds/skuls
Summary: Jackson and his first birthday spent with Mulder and Scully.





	5/20/19

He doesn’t know why he’s doing this.

He shouldn’t be doing this. He should be visiting his parents, like he planned, the way he did on Christmas. He should sneak out and go have a day to himself; it’s his eighteenth birthday, for fuck’s sake. He shouldn’t be doing this, wallowing in a past he doesn’t remember. He doubts Dana and Mulder even know it’s his birthday. But yet, here he is rummaging through the boxes in Mulder’s office. 

This impulse, whatever it is, is likely spurned on by seventeen years of wondering about his birth parents on his birthday. Who they were, why they’d given him up. Sometimes, he’d seen the woman he hadn’t known was Dana yet; when he was a kid, he’d always loved that. When he’d gotten older, he’d resented the fact that he’d wondered, that he’d always had to wonder. And now? Now he doesn’t really know what to think. He knows the truth, what happened, but that doesn’t get rid of the curiosity about the whole thing. What happened to him before he was Jackson Van de Kamp.

After Lily was born, he’d asked and Dana had told him about what it’d been like before she’d given him up for adoption. He can’t remember half of what she said, the words jumbling up in his head, but he knows it was filled with sentiment, a deep affection he’s only seen in bits and pieces from Dana and Mulder. (Either because they are holding back and giving him the space he asked for, or because he isn’t looking hard enough.) She talked a lot about the danger, reiterating that she did give him up for adoption because she was scared for him, but they were all exhausted then and, as much as Lils has grown since, it feels like forever ago. It feels like he still knows nothing. He wants to know. He knows he never made it to a birthday with Dana or Mulder (including the seventeenth birthday he spent sleeping under a bridge, freezing cold and trying to convince himself to go and ask Dana and Mulder for money, which he did the following week), but he wants the details from the first year of his life. If he can find them.

Jackson pokes at the stack of boxes on the shelves. The most outward one is old baby stuff that Lily has outgrown—why they don’t just sell that shit, Jackson doesn’t know, it’s not like they’re going to have another one—but behind that are old X-Files, a box labeled  _Stuff from the office—Scully_  and several labeled  _Mom_. Jackson swallows uncomfortably, lugging a heavy stack off of the shelf.

His elbow bumps a box and sends a box tumbling to the ground. He swears softly, preparing himself for footsteps or the earsplitting cries of the kid. Dana and Mulder had fallen asleep on the couch last night during the movie, Lily curled on Dana’s stomach with Mulder’s hand on her back, and they were still there when Jackson came downstairs. But he hears nothing. Dana and Mulder used to be some of the jumpiest people he’s ever seen, but since the kid was born, they’ve slept like the dead. He breathes out a sigh of relief and stoops over to pick up the box. And that’s when he sees the label:  _William—2001-2002_.

Jackson gulps, his throat suddenly dry. Why the hell did he think this was a good idea? He crouches on the floor besides the box and pries off a layer of packing tape, digging in deeply with his fingernails. He opens the box gingerly, like it’s the box from  _Se7en_  or something, like it’s going to explode. There’s a layer of dust over the whole thing like it hasn’t been opened in a long time. Jackson rummages for his phone and turns on the flashlight; it’s dark as shit in the curtained office and he doesn’t want to turn on the light.

Inside is a hodgepodge of baby stuff that’s at least as cheesy as the stuff Mulder picked out for the kid: an ugly hat, an uglier doll that makes Jackson laugh, a stack of onesies that seem to have the expected space theme (although some are the sensible ones he’d expect from Dana and a few are the overly cutesy kind that are neither of their styles). Jackson pokes at some toys: a bear who’s ear is a bit chewed, a robot thing that looks like it’d make noise. And at the bottom of the box, he finds a stack of Polaroids of a baby who has to be him. 

A sudden lump rises in Jackson’s throat. He’s never seen any pictures of himself this young. They’re all labeled in Dana’s precise handwriting, slightly faded:  _William, 8 months and 7 days; William, 7 months and 18 days; William, 6 months._  He thumbs through them with a overly careful hand, like they’re not super old photos and will shatter on impact. This, he thinks, this is when he was a different person. When he was William Scully (or Mulder, or whatever), before he was Jackson Van de Kamp. He wonders how different he’d be if Dana and Mulder had never given him up. If he would be any different. If these pictures would be framed somewhere and not stuffed in a dusty box they can’t stand to look at. 

He lifts up the stack of Polaroids and uncovers two that are paperclipped together, that make an unexpected lump rise in his throat. The one on top is of him and Dana, a surprisingly young version of Dana. She’s sitting on a striped couch in front of a Christmas tree. She’s smiling, and Jackson knows Dana well enough to know that kind of smile is unusual. (He sees it sometimes with Mulder or Lily, or occasionally with him, but never often.) She seems to be a muted sort of happy, like something is missing. (And it didn’t take a detective to figure out who; Dana is wearing a worn Oxford sweatshirt that is clearly too large for her, the same one he’s seen in Mulder’s closet.) But there is an unquestionable amount of love in her eyes as she looks down at the baby (him) in her arms. He’s dressed in the dumbest UFO onesie and chewing on a teething ring. Dana is cupping his head in one hand and has the pointer finger of her other hand captured in his tiny fingers. She actually looks like a mother to him, the way she does with Lily. Jackson swallows painfully. It’s hard to look at; he yanks it off of the stack and finds one that is even harder to see. Dana and Mulder curled up with a baby (with him) on a bed, so similar to how they fell asleep last night. He’s asleep on Mulder’s chest and he looks extraordinarily small, the way Lily looked when she was a newborn. The three of them look like a family. The picture is captioned _Dana, Fox, and William, 5/25/01_  in an unfamiliar looping handwriting. Five days after his birthday. 

Jackson lets the photos drop back into the box and wipes his eyes. They’re wet, which shakes him. He hadn’t expected this. He puts things back in the box too quickly, before he changes his mind and reaches in to retrieve the two smudgy Polaroids. He wants to keep them. With the pictures of Lily that Mulder has tacked up on the corkboard, he deserves this.

Putting the boxes up on the shelf somehow doesn’t wake the kid up, but hitting a squeaky floorboard on his way down the hall does. She erupts to life from the living room, wailing like a banshee. (Jackson went through a spell of calling Lils  _Banshee_ , and Mulder found it hilarious.) Jackson grimaces and shakes his head affectionately. He can hear Mulder and Dana coming to life groggily, murmuring comforting things. He slips the Polaroids into his pocket and goes out into the living room.

Daggoo, curled up in a dog bed in the corner, yips with excitement when he sees him. Lily seems to wail louder, her face red. "Hi, Jackson,” says Dana, rubbing Lily’s back. “Happy birthday.”

Jackson’s neck grows hot with embarrassment. He hadn’t expected them to remember. “Um, thanks,” he says awkwardly. “I… I didn’t think you’d remember.”

“Of course we remember,” Mulder says, stretching a bit as he sits up. “It was an eventful day. You were born, we rode in a helicopter…” 

Jackson makes a surprised choking sound. “A helicopter?” he repeats. 

“Yes,” Dana says in a dry voice. “Your birth was a little more… exciting than I would’ve preferred. A hospital would’ve been nice.” 

“I can confirm that sentiment,” Mulder says, standing from the couch. “Should I grab her formula, Scully?”

“Yes, she sounds hungry.” Scully kisses Lily before passing her over to Mulder; she snuggles into her father ( _their_ father, Jackson thinks with a strange, half-guilty pang as he thinks of the Polaroid in his pocket, and then of the father who is buried miles away in Norfolk), her tear-stained face rubbing against his shirt. 

“Hey, banshee,” Jackson says to the kid in an attempt to lighten the muddled confusion in his brain. He reaches out and she grips his finger in her hand, their semi tradition. He thinks she’s going to be a strong one. 

“I picked up a cake for you last night,” says Dana off-handedly. “Oreo cheesecake, right? We could eat some for breakfast.”

Jackson blinks in surprise. “Wow, Dana, that seems a little offbrand for you.”

“It’s your birthday, kid,” Mulder says from the kitchen as he warms Lily’s bottle. “Scully is serious about birthdays.”

“Not a kid anymore,” Dana says with a quiet sort of fondness. Jackson thinks of the Polaroids again with a pang. Dana smiling under the Christmas tree, Dana asleep with him and Mulder on the bed, a peaceful look on her face. 

He considers bringing it up. Changes his mind, tells Lils very seriously, “You lucked out, Lils.” Lily gives him a serious look in return overtop of the bottle she is drinking hungrily from. 

“Is there anything you want to do today?” Mulder offers, swaying with Lily cradled against his chest. “We could hike somewhere, if you want, I know some good trails… or we could go into DC for the day.” 

“I dunno,” Jackson says, sitting in the overstuffed armchair he likes. The last time he actually had a proper birthday celebration was when he turned sixteen. Dinner with his parents, and then sneaking out to the sugar factory with a few friends. He’d gotten drunk off his ass and kissed Bri for the first time. The memories burn now; remembering his old life is too hard sometimes. He can recall almost every birthday he’s had, through real memories or through video tape, but the one he can’t remember, the only one he didn’t spend with his parents. The very first one, spent in a dusty house in Georgia. He’s heard the story before, but he can almost picture it now: Dana frightened and protective, holding him to her, Mulder bursting in like the hero in an old action movie. He almost wishes he could remember. 

Dana takes the cake she’d gotten out of the refrigerator and slices it with a butter knife. Come to think of it, Jackson can’t remember repeatedly mentioning that he liked that kind of cake. He thinks he said it was his favorite once last summer when they met him at the Cheesecake Factory in Richmond, but he had no idea she’d actually remember. He sits at the table as Dana puts a slice on a plate for him. “I know it’s a Monday, but you’re not technically in school yet,” she says. “Maybe you could see if your friends from work want to meet up later or something…” 

“I found something,” Jackson says in a rush, and they both look at him in surprise. Lily’s head lolls on Mulder’s shoulder, but Mulder and Dana are both watching him expectantly. Maybe even nervously. He reaches into his pocket before he can change his mind and lets the photos drop on the table. 

Mulder’s breath catches in his throat as he sees them, leaning closer to get a better look. Dana looks at them with a reverent sort of expression, a little sadly. “I’d forgotten where these were,” she says softly, touching the one with the three of them gingerly. “I wanted to find them last year, but I couldn’t remember…” 

“They were in the box of my stuff,” says Jackson. “In Mulder’s office.” 

Mulder reaches down with one hand and scoops up the one with all three of them. “I didn’t know this existed, Scully,” he says in a quiet tone as well, so quiet that he could be whispering. “How did…”

“Mom took it,” says Dana in an emotion-choked tone. “She gave it to me.” 

“So that was before you left, Mulder,” Jackson offers up gingerly. 

“Yeah,” Mulder says, running his thumb over the glossy front. “This was the night after you came home from the hospital.”

“And this was Christmas in San Diego,” Dana adds, touching the corner of the other photo. “With your Uncle Bill, the one you met over video call on Christmas.”

“Oh, yeah,” he says. He knows who Bill is. 

Dana smiles a little wistfully as she looks down at the picture. Jackson clears his throat and offers, “I look a little like Lils, don’t you think? Like, minus the hair.”

Dana laughs quietly. “A little bit.”

Mulder laughs a little too, runs his thumb over the photo again before handing it back to Jackson. “I never forgot those three days with you and your mother,” he says. “I always regretted leaving you. I never got over the guilt of it.”

Jackson gulps, looks away. Looks down at the photo again, the peaceful looks on Dana and Mulder’s faces. He doesn’t know what to say. “Could I… could I have these?” he asks tentatively. 

“Of course,” Dana says. Mulder’s free hand comes down on his shoulder and squeezes it comfortingly. 

“Thank you.” Jackson tucks the photos in his pocket and looks back up. “Thank you for… the cake, and for… thank you.” He rubs his hand over his mouth, takes a deep breath and adds, “I’m glad… I’m glad I’ve met you. Gotten to know you. I always wondered about my birth parents on today, and now…”

He can’t finish. He doesn’t think he needs to. Mulder squeezes his shoulder. Lily’s tiny foot kicks him in the back of the head, which makes Jackson smirk. Dana smiles at him, covers his hand with hers briefly. 

The photos sit heavy in his pocket, proof of a life other than the one he is used to. Proof that his birth parents loved him, the proof he was always looking for as a child. That feels like enough. 


End file.
